Compact of Fire
by Akela.Rochi
Summary: A frozen Gilbert returns home to the House of Dreams and a sleepy Anne shows her love for him without saying a word.


_"Love is a Spirit all compact of Fire"_

January had begun with a storm that had buried the harbor and the surrounding town in a foot of snow. All that Sunday Anne and Gilbert had not left the house save for feeding and brushing the horses in the barn. That morning, as Gilbert had come back into the house, stomping his boots in the entrance before sitting in front of the kitchen fire, he had looked up to see Anne standing by the sitting room window. She hadn't bothered putting on proper clothes and had instead simply drawn a robe over her nightgown.

She had stood with her back to him, framed by the light coming in through the window and gazing out into the whitening world. Her hair hung down her back, falling to her elbows in an unruly plait which Gilbert himself had braided into her hair that morning.

Gilbert paused from unlacing his boots to stare at her for a moment. The brightness of the snow outside and the white cotton of her robe caused her hair to glow an even more vibrant red then usual. Gilbert's mouth twitched with the thought of how upset she would be if he were to mention this to her.

As he stared, Anne had languidly turned her head to glance over her shoulder and her eyes had captured him. Her lips had been slightly open, showing the edge of her front teeth and Gilbert had met her gaze for only a moment before dropping his eyes down to his laces, a hot flush rising up to his ears. As a doctor he was unflappable, but as a man in the presence of his lovely wife, he still felt like a bashful young boy.

She had used those teeth on him one night: sinking them into the side of his neck. The resulting shivers had rushed from his chest, to behind his eyes, and down to the tops of his thighs. As of yet, he had never been brave enough to ask her to do it again.

Gilbert darted a look back up from the floor to see Anne still watching him. When she saw him peaking up at her, her face bloomed into a sweet smile. A smile that said her thoughts were as innocent as his were otherwise.

That day in the kitchen had been two weeks ago and now Gilbert longed for the heat that had flooded through his body as Anne had stood looking at him from beside the window. After the storm, the weather at Glen St. Mary had grown colder and colder. Every morning as he had hitched up the sleigh in preparation for rounds, Gilbert had thought that it couldn't possibly get any colder and yet each following morning he had been proved wrong.

Now he stamped his feet in an attempt to keep the blood flowing as his numb fingers fumbled uselessly with the buckles of the horse's reins. The sleigh ride home after seeing his patient had been brutal. The father of a young girl with croup had come thumping on the Blythe's door just as he and Anne had been finishing up their supper and had begged Gilbert to look in on his daughter. Three hours later the child was now on the mend and Gilbert was returned home.

Frustrated with his incompetent fingers Gilbert bent and used his teeth to pull the leather strap from the final buckle before tossing the entire harness haphazardly into the sleigh. Proper maintenance be dammed! He was too cold to care about putting everything away properly. He led the horse into its stall, covered it with two blankets, and then stepped out of the barn, bolting the door behind him. The squeaking snow beneath his feet gave testament to the frigid crystal night.

Stepping though the kitchen door, Gilbert saw that Anne had left a candle burning for him on the table. His fingers were so cold that he couldn't untie his laces and he stood for a few freezing minutes with his fingers held practically in the candle flame. Once he was able to loosen his laces sufficiently, Gilbert toed off is boots and hung his coat and hat on the peg by the door.

He ascended the stairs in his stockinged feet; the base of the candlestick cupped in his palm rather than trusting in his still feeble fingers. Gilbert opened the door to his and Anne's bedroom as quietly as he could; relying on the silent hinges, which he had oiled for just such late night returns as this. Anne was lying in their bed, her hair splayed out above her head in the same fashion she slept in every night. Gilbert moved to set the candle down on the set of drawers and began to undress. He dropped his clothes on the floor without bothering to put them away. He would worry about cleanliness in the morning; all he wanted right now was the warmth of his bed. Gilbert glanced at the nightshirt, which Anne had thoughtfully laid out across the back of a chair for him, but the thought of pulling the freezing fabric over his head was too much.

He blew out the candle and slithered under the covers like a block of ice. He lay there for a moment trying desperately not to shiver and wake Anne. He fiercely longed to move onto her side of the bed and soak up her warmth, but he would be a horrid husband were he to wake he with his frozen body.

Suddenly Anne shifted, rolling her body towards his and whispering, "Gil" in a sleepy greeting. For a second Gilbert felt chagrined for waking her before Anne wrapped her arms and legs around him.

The heat. The bliss.

"I love her," thought Gilbert as his wife wound her own limbs with his frozen ones.

Anne became more awake with the realization that her husband had returned to her like a blast from the Arctic. Gilbert heard her moan of, "Oh, cold!," even has she found his numb hands and brought them to her sides in an attempt to warm them.

Gilbert melted under his wife's embrace and chuckled at the tiny grasp she gave when he nuzzled his frosty nose close to her ear. A line from the Shakespeare came to him as his fingers began to thaw, "Love is a spirit all compact of fire." With his eyes closed and his faced pressed into Anne's cheek, Gilbert felt the Bard's words ringing true deep within his soul.

_Author's Note_

_This is my first FanFic and so I am very open to reviews/suggests when if comes to writing style, format. Etc. _


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